


Not a Soul by Her Side

by SlaveToGravity



Series: Buried at Last [2]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, Beyond the Walls, Blood and Gore, F/M, Hurt No Comfort, Implied Relationship, Major Character Injury, Partner Betrayal, Titans, dilemma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-09
Updated: 2019-06-09
Packaged: 2020-04-23 11:49:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19150447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SlaveToGravity/pseuds/SlaveToGravity
Summary: It's always been duty over feelings for them, and they both never asked for anything else. They signed up for this, they knew what would come. But in the end, stuck way beyond the walls and bleeding way too much for it to be healthy, Mikasa wonders if he'll choose her instead of his duties.Really, she just wishes to not die with not a soul by her side.





	Not a Soul by Her Side

**Author's Note:**

> It's just kinda gory, in a way? In the end especially, so just watch out for that. I don't really find it disturbing but I know that some people do, so be careful.

          The wind blew harder than it should have. The leaves, stained with purple and red, hints of orange at the edge of each and every branch, waltzed and tilted, fell and floated away, carried by the strong and heavy wind they didn’t take into account before the mission started. And the weather was cold, way too cold, for only a month of October. Soon, the sun would set, the wind would blow stronger again, the weather would freeze more than now, and Mikasa would find herself alone, without the company of someone to hold her hand while awaiting for death. Dying alone felt like a punishment she didn’t deserve, and yet, not a soul by her side, she wondered if it were more of a blessing than a curse.

          She had discarded her cape quite some time ago. Perched high in a tree, she had watched it float on her back, fight against the breeze. She had quickly gotten annoyed of the cloth hitting her cheeks every now and again, and in a swift movement, had thrown it away. Instead of flying away like she had expected it to do, it had simply fallen to the ground bellow, and she could only observe the wings of freedom pathetically lay on the ground, alongside her broken blades, the ones she fought so well with just hours ago. She didn’t have any blade left, leaving her feeling naked, vulnerable and useless, more so than ever. She hated the feeling, hated the pitiful state she was in, but couldn’t do much except stay standing on a branch, alone, in the middle of nowhere. Her head throbbed with every shuffle of leaves, every blow of wind, every crack of wood. Soon, the branch will fall, and her with it. She could only wait for her future demise, alone, with not a soul by her side.

 

“You plan on dying here? That’s quite pathetic, even for you Ackerman.”

 

          She couldn’t deny the fear she had felt for a second, hearing the voice of someone so near her ear. She flinched before looking behind with the widest eyes she had ever have and there, standing tall despite the distance and his small stature, the midget she had told herself countless of times she hated more than titans was waiting, not a care in the world. He didn’t seem to be hurt, didn’t seem to be limping or struggling, he just seemed tired, more than usual, with maybe a bit of apprehension in his stance. She blinked once, twice, narrowing her eyes to see him better from where she stood. He didn’t move, didn’t bother even looking behind him. He didn’t seem scared in any single way, and Mikasa suddenly felt small, even though she was taller, higher, on top of a tree that would break soon.

 

“What are you doing here? Where is the rest of the squad?” She yelled, because the wind was deafening and the leaves were loud, way too loud, she almost couldn’t hear herself thinking. But he heard, listened, even, because he looked at her direction and tilted his head. Like an owl, she thought.

 

“Got lost,” he yelled back. She choked on nothing but her surprise, and she felt incredibly taller all of a sudden, taller than him.

 

“You got lost? What kind of-” She couldn’t believe it, perched high on her branch, that a captain with years of training, even maybe a whole decade of experience, could get lost during the simplest of expedition. But again she got left behind herself. Her ego had taken the best of her and the desire to do more, to kill more, had taken over her sense of duty. She had made the worst choices she could have, and here she was, without a weapon, without a soul by her side, or so she had thought until now.

 

          Ironed grapple-hooks suddenly planted firmly and swiftly at the branch she was standing on, and soon, the corporal followed, in a cat-like agility. She watched him carefully stand on the branch, right by her side. The wind blew harder, the leaves fell in a cascade of purple, red and orange, the branch cracked and the emptiness got filled with a soul of its own. She wasn’t alone anymore.

 

“I got lost, yes, I know, ah ah, laugh, but while you’re fucking grinning like a child, we’re doomed here,” he spat at her, blue eyes colder and darker than usual. Now that she could look at him from closer, he looked completely disheveled. His hair was a mess, his skin was paler, almost as pale as hers, his lips were busted, cut right at the middle, and a large gash cut right through his right hand. One of his fingers was missing, and his handle was completely busted. He had wrapped his cravat around his hand, and his hold around the blade was weak, way too weak to be able to cut through flesh. She would have pitied him were it not for the teeth-marked wound she had around her right shoulder. Her own hold was pathetic, and he easily saw the way she stood, false confidence written on her face. “What happened to your shoulder? You’re soaked.”

 

“It’s not as bad as it looks. I got bitten while I was falling. It didn’t cut through my shoulder, it just crushed some nerves and pierced the skin.”

 

“You feel anything?”

 

“I don’t,” he got closer to her, eyes roaming around her arm. He touched her elbow, and she found herself wishing for a contact she could feel, not only one she could see. “My whole arm is numb.”

 

“You don’t even feel your own blood? It’s soaking your entire back,” his voice was stern yet concern was hanging from his own words, creating a new kind of fear in her mind. She coughed, taken by surprise as his hand traveled along her right shoulder blade and her spine. She could feel fingertips ghosting her body and teeth digging her flesh. She brushed his hand away.

 

“The bleeding stopped-”

 

“No it didn’t,” he affirmed, his hand nearing her neck, fingers brushing against her chin as he took a hold of her scarf. She flinched, gripping his hand in a swift motion. He looked at her then, and she saw all the concern he had, all the apprehension. She knew she reflected it in a way. She let go of his hand, he took the scarf away, strangely slowly, undoing what Eren had done years ago. He moved her arm up, rolled the scarf around her torso and her shoulder, tying it in a small knot in her back. She let her arms fall then, feeling tired. He pat her good should. “And it won’t if we stay here. We have to move.”

 

“I don’t know where we are,” she simply stated, feeling the exhaustion of the day creeping in her head. Needles kept poking at her right arm and shoulder, she had enough of the feeling. She wanted it gone. “And I don’t know where to go.”

 

“I do,” the branch cracked again. Leaves fell harder under their feet. She stumbled, the wind seemed to knock her down. Levi caught her waist, keeping her standing. She could his hand digging in her hip, teeth digging in her shoulder, grossly disfigured fingers catching her legs. She pushed his hand away, he looked strangely at her. “We’re not far from the walls. Maybe five or six miles from there. Erwin made us change the direction when those shitty deviants wouldn’t leave us alone. Instead of going North like planned we went South-West. Kind of a stretch, let me tell you, we could have just killed those big assholes, but this smaller asshole of a commander we have wouldn’t fucking listen,” he rages now, his eyes narrowed to the extreme, looking down at the cape she had thrown, his good hand balled up in a furious fist. “Turns out, it just made everything worse.”

 

          She listened to his every words, waiting for him to finish. Telling herself she doesn’t care would be a lie, to him as it is to her, for he never spoke that much in a single day, not even to his own squad. And though his words were vile and crude, he spoke the truth she stopped herself from saying aloud. When she had heard the whistle of the pistols, when she had listened to the orders being shouted and passed soldier by soldier, and when she had seen the green smoke fly through the air, high in the sky, piercing through the lower clouds, she had simply kept her mouth shut, bitten her tongue in annoyance, and had followed whatever orders were shouted at her ear. Never did she think she would end up here, alone, without a soul by her side, only to be joined by the corporal of her very own nightmares.

 

“Do you have gas?” He cut her train of thoughts, his voice calmer, lower than before. She wondered if it were to save them the risk of attracting a loose titan or to just save them from the tiredness of yelling again. “I’m almost out of it. We’ll have to run most of the time.” She nodded at him before jumping down the tree. The branch swung under the sudden loss of weigh, and the captain felt obligated to follow. He let himself fall by her side, stepping on the dirty green cloth. It was covered in dirt, dead leaves and mud, and the wings of freedom could only look like ones of a young dead bird, not ones of freedom. He didn’t look twice at it, pushing it away from him. “We’ll make a run, as simple as that. If a titan comes and if the possibility comes, hide. Otherwise, run for as long as you can. Do not attempt to kill it if it’s not necessary to do so. If one of us runs out of gas, one of us dies, and my duty here is to make us both come back behind the walls in one piece. Understood?”

 

          Mikasa could only nod, not daring to contradict such simple orders. They were made on the go and they sounded as desperate as him. She couldn’t miss the desperation and the sound of pure and raw defeat he was trying to hide, right below his tongue, like bad food he didn’t want to swallow. She herself couldn’t stay optimistic. The cases of soldiers stuck outside of the walls who made it back to safety were rare enough to never be talked about, and making it back alive, in one piece, was marked as more of a dream than a reality. In classes, she remembered, they would only talk about the possibilities of getting stuck outside, and the lessons would always end in the same way: if you get left behind, no one will come for you, for a life wasted away was already enough. They would exit the room fearing more for their lives than anything else, and those classes pushed people away from wearing the wings of freedom on their back. Outside the walls meant freedom, and freedom meant death. If freedom came in such a prize, then people would give up on freedom. It was as simple as that, and Mikasa never understood Eren’s reasoning.

          Levi once again cut her thoughts short. She shook her head and followed him. First, they started slowly, paying close attention to their surroundings, almost tip-toeing through the dead leaves. Then, they started running and already, Mikasa felt out of breath. She had run longer distances than ten miles in a single day, in a single morning, even, but right now, running for more than a minute felt impossible. Her legs were heavy, her shoulder sagging, her body swaying more than it should. Light-headed and exhausted, she felt way too out of character to even think about the possibilities of making it out alive and wall.

          The captain stayed strong compared to her. His wounded hand stayed put against his gear while his other hand swayed with his run, balled up in a strong fist. She could see he was at the edge of speeding ahead, leaving her behind, and if anything, she wouldn’t be too surprised for he had always put duty before anything else. If one of them had to die, like he said not even five minutes ago, it would be her. Humanity’s strongest shouldn’t die for a simple soldier. Yes, she had a unique fighting skill no other cadet had and yes, she had a title on her own, just like him, but in the end, good combat skills and a fancy title couldn’t hide the truth: she wasn’t worth sacrificing the strongest soldier they had over. She would be disappointed, though. She thought they had a better understanding of each other, a better relationship, and they made a great pair when fighting. She had a future, too, despite what they told her countless of times. Remaining a weapon until the tragic death they had promised her wasn’t enough, she would never be satisfied, and if she wanted a true future, one she believed fate deserved her, it would be one of peace and relief. Happiness could be an option, she just wanted to live a life of tranquility, at the borders of the walls, far from civilization, and if she had to be alone, then so be it. She would die alone, with not a soul around, no company. She would be sad but satisfied.

 

“Ackerman, titan, on your left. Take cover as soon as possible,” the captain yelled back at her. He was already running away, and though she could read how unsatisfied he felt at that, he at least followed his own orders and ran towards a group of trees around two hundreds meters away. She followed suit.

 

          Her legs supported her towards him, but as she started turning, the ground shook. Leaves fell harder, the wind grew stronger. A scream, like the awakening of a beast, resonated towards them, and Mikasa found herself loosing balance. She stumbled but gained back her equilibrium, and with the momentum, she fought against tiredness and ran towards the group of trees where Levi was already climbing the branches. No fear crept her back, no apprehension covered her thought, she just fought against her own body and ran, taking speed in the way she would stumble. Her mind was buzzing, her thoughts became parsed, and she could finally feel her blood tickling down her back, her thighs, soaking her underwear in an uncomfortable way she already hated. But she ran nonetheless, and she all but threw herself on a branch, climbing it haphazardly, her hands gripping on the weak wood. Higher was Levi, standing still, looking at the titans walking by. She trembled.

 

“We’ll stay here for now. We’ll move later,” he said, voice clear as day among the shuffle of the leaves. The wind only grew heavier, the sun started to die down. She pushed her hair behind her ear. He didn’t once look at her, and she started wondering if he were fighting a war on his own, deep down. He threw a glance at her form then at the walls far from here. He seemed to wonder for a minute. “How much gas do you have left?”

 

          She checked quickly, removing the gas tanks from their lodge. She shook them a little near her ear before putting them back in place, “not much, but enough to make it back.”

 

“That’s optimistic.”

 

“That’s the truth.”

 

          He sighed then. He didn’t touch his gas tanks, and she wondered of he had any gas left, enough at least to make it up the walls once there. She could see the walls from where she was, it was tempting, to just fly there, but she could also make out the forms of titans, alive and waiting, disgustingly grinning at nothing. She breathed strongly, trying to forget the tiredness taking over her whole existence, and inhaled ever stronger, ignoring the way her own lungs burnt, the way her limbs fell numb, the way only her back arched against the wood was keeping her upright and standing. She threw a tired look at the other trees around them. They all seemed weak, dancing with the wind, their leaves falling, and as she looked up a little, following the seems of the trees, a giant eye looked back. She suppressed a scream.

 

“Captain,” she threw a trembling hand up, catching his ankle with the grip of a toddler. It was weak, shaking with all its core, but she couldn’t find the strength she used to have. It was gone, just like her last hopes of living it down. “Captain,” she whispered again and this time, he looked down at her. At first he seemed annoyed, but seeing her stare, wide, terrified, and looking up, he followed. He reacted immediately.

 

“Get away from here!” And she did.

 

          She jumped down the tree, ignoring the way her ankle shifted, the way her whole left leg bent under her weigh. She ran and ran, taking speed as mush as she could. A gargantuan hand fell on the branches they were standing on, and the tree bent sickly, completely cracked. Splints of wood flew away, ejected by the force of the impact. She felt a hand, one the size of hers, catch her own, and without a single warning, her feet got lifted off the ground. Like a rag doll, she got carried away. Gas obscured her vision, but the engine stuttered sooner than intended, it seemed, for Levi groaned at the sound. They continued flying, feet dangling, hers sometimes hitting the ground too violently, and she felt her toes breaking at impact, hard against the ground. She would scream, but her throat was entirely closed. The eye was still following them, curiously watching, and the teeth below it sickly shone under the new moonlight. The titan was a five meters, no more, but its speed surprised and terrified her more than anything as it jumped and followed. It groaned, spit falling down the lines of its chin as its hands reached for the two flying forms. She knew what they looked like for those giants, like flies, weak ones, only seeking safety, satisfying their curiosity by sacrificing their lives. The hands fell by their sides, and Levi grunted even more at her weigh. The engine wouldn’t hold for long, and the sound of it was too loud to be ignored. The titan opened its mouth way too wide for it to be realistic, and as he jumped, Mikasa feared for her legs, dangling behind. But it fell on grass and mud, biting the ground in a low groan. Its teeth got stuck and a small cry, seemingly more like a sob, of relief flew out of her throat.

          The walls were getting nearer. Their gigantic form drew closer, and Mikasa found herself wishing to be on top already. But the gas stuttered, and soon, nothing came out of the engine. For the span of a second, nothing moved, they flew with the momentum. Fresh air blew them away, and they found themselves falling from too high for it to be safe. The ground neared more than the walls, and Mikasa closed her eyes. Arms snaked around her shoulders and she buried her nose in the crook of Levi’s neck. They fell hard, harder than anything. Her back hit the ground with a force stronger than anything. Her lungs stopped for a moment. She couldn’t breathe. Her mouth open, but nothing entered, nothing exited. She couldn’t breathe. She panicked, but she couldn’t take any air in. She gritted her teeth as Levi moved around her.

 

“We have to run, stand up,” he sounded out of breath too, way too tired. Looking down, she saw his hand bleed, the cravat torn apart. The rest of his finger was pathetically teared, the skin hanging, the bone sticking out in a way it wasn’t supposed to. The blood was spilling like a cascade, and Mikasa wondered of the wound of her shoulder had opened again. He stood up on trembling legs, his boots shredded, his jeans torn, blood sipping though new infected wounds. “Stand up,” he took her wrist and forced her up. When her scarf came undone and fell, she got her answer. The scarf was soaked, not a part of it was dry. What she saw he saw too, and her end felt sooner than his. She trembled. “We run now. We run. Follow me.”

 

          But what good would it make? Her toes, broken and swollen, hurt even more against the leather of her boots, and her right arm was completely numb. The gas she had wouldn’t hold them both up the walls, and the gears were too weak and busted to support their weigh. If anything, he was leading her to a false sense of hope, all to see her die at the bottom of the walls. But she followed nonetheless, taken in by his hand around her wrist. Maybe he was the one trying to reach for some kind of hope, hoping for her to stay alive, but in the end, it will only end in him being even more torn apart by the war going on inside his head. Between duty and feelings, he would end up having to chose, and one of those choices would lead him to his demise. Her body already looked like it was decaying, and as her head became lighter, as her limbs became number, and as the pain in her broken toes and twisted leg became none-apparent, she selfishly wished for him to chose his feelings over his duty as a soldier ad humanity’s strongest.

          They got nearer and nearer as the walls grew taller. The wind blew, the temperature dropped. Her blood soaked her socks as a loud groan resonated behind them. Levi’s grip got stronger around her wrist and the ground shook under their feet. Less than a mile away the wall was there, cannons on top, gates closed. Levi sped up, taking her along. For him, her weigh felt more like one of a corpse than a soldier. He looked behind him quickly. The bags under her eyes, the blood soaking her body, the look of exhaustion covering her face, he felt like he was loosing her; but again, he’ll have to loose her one way or another, and if she were to die now, of blood loss, she wouldn’t have to feel the pain of betrayal once they’ll reach the walls. He knew, deep down, that the gears around his hips won’t hold them both.

          The ground shook harder, the groan sounded closer and louder. As the titan came near, Levi threw himself against the wall, the momentum of his run stopping him from slowing down. Mikasa fell by his side, and here they were, waiting for the doom they had to face. They both panted loudly, Levi let go of her hand. He adjusted his stance, positioned his gears correctly. He snaked his fingers around the triggers, the rest of his right index painfully pressing against the triggers. He shook, hesitation louder than the titan coming. Mikasa tiredly watched it run towards them. Less than a mile away, tall, raging with all its might. She stayed seated. Levi pondered, wondered, thought, but in the end, he showed his good hand at Mikasa. She looked at it, thought of taking it.

 

“Give me your gas.”

 

          She wondered, for a fraction of second, if he would take her with him, but his fugitive look and his trembling hands made her shake her thoughts of slim survival away. She detached the bottles and put them in his hand. They resonated empty but she knew there was still some gas left, enough to climb the walls. He took the bottles and quickly placed them on his gear. He positioned himself, and it was when his feet flew up the ground yet hers stayed firmly grounded that she knew he chose duty over feelings. She tried not to be disappointed as she saw him become just a mere detail in her vision, and she tried to be relieved when she saw him disappear behind the top of the wall, but she failed at both, and it was sudden and unknown fear that took over her whole body instead.

          Mikasa knew when to give up. She knew when duties came first, and she knew more than anyone when to stay silent. When a hand way bigger than her snaked around her arms, when grossly disfigured fingers squeezed her so tight she couldn’t breathe, when broken nails dug into the entirety of her ribs, she kept herself from screaming at him to get her back. She didn’t insult his cowardice, didn’t cuss at his sense of duty. She took the pain in like the soldier she had to be until the very end. She just silently cried at her foolishness, for believing, even for just the fraction of a second, that he would choose her over duties. Teeth crushed her skull, her shoulder again. One of her eyes popped out of its socket, her jaw broke, her ears bled, her ribs crumbled, her lungs imploded. It’s the shock of it all that ended up killing her, not the teeth going though her spine.

          In the end, just like she imagined it, she died alone, with not a soul by her side.

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! Second work. I wanted to post smut, but that will come after, in the next work. It will be a three chapters one again and right now, I'm trying to write a Violet Evergarden kind of AU, but it will take such a long time.  
> Anyway, I hope you found this one interesting. I'm sorry if it was bad, I at least tried. I kinda liked writing it. Also, most of my works will focus around Mikasa, but I'll try to change it sometimes.  
> Again, comments and kudos are always welcome!
> 
> See you next time, and thank you!   
> Sur-ce, buh-bye!


End file.
